Serial Connections
by Timesprite
Summary: Episode tags and related drabbles. Spoilers for all episodes.
1. Atonement

**Seems to be a trend--so I'm putting all my short episode tags up here (I'm still going to post longer ones seperatly, I think...) This is set between episodes 23 & 24 of the first season

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It was a stupid thing to do. Every bit of training he had was telling him so. The place was probably compromised already. His apartment hadn't been, but he moved around enough these days that not even Section Nine knew exactly where he was living at any given time. Well, the Major undoubtedly knew, but she was an exception to nearly every rule in the book.

Which brought him back to his current situation. Risking his neck... for what? A stupid watch. He couldn't even pretend he had a better reason. The major wouldn't come back--she had more sense than he did. No, it was his stupid loyalty driving him on. He knew it meant something to her, even if she pretended it didn't. He'd lost his temper with her--that last little bit of feigned indifference had been too much.

Maybe this was his apology. Maybe it was just his way of pretending he knew he'd see her again. Atonement or delusion, it didn't matter. He wasn't about to turn back now.


	2. Reconstruction

Disclaimer: Ghost in the Shell: Standalone Complex isn't mine, please don't sue. I'm poor anyway.

Set after the last episode in the first season.

----

"I can't help but notice he hasn't been himself lately." The first week back as a unit had been filled largly with meeting and briefings, the latest of which had been a discussion of just what would have to be done before Section 9 could return to active status. It wasn't the first time Togusa had noticed the absence of Batou's usual sarcastic remarks.

"He misses the Tachikoma, that's all." The Major was perched on the arm of one of the couches, seemingly content to stay where she was awhile longer.

"Maybe." Togusa looked thoughtful for a moment. "He seemed especially angry with you, though. Did I miss something?"

She sighed. "When the chief and I planned Section 9's dismantling, we intended to have everyone taken into custody. The problem was, we knew Batou probably wouldn't let them take him in alive. We had to make other arrangements."

"Arrangements?"

"He was there when I 'died.' It was the only way to lower his guard enough to let him be apprehended."

Togusa glanced at her. "Didn't a police sniper shoot you in the head? No wonder he's still pissed off."

She shrugged a little. "It was the only way."

"Yeah. Same reason I spent three months thinking everyone had been thrown in jail."

"Don't tell me you're angry, too."

"No, not really. I understand why it happened the way it did. But if I were, I think I'd be justified."

"We did what we had to in order to preserve Section 9. We wanted everyone back in one piece."

"I'm not questioning the motives, Major. It's just..." He paused, hesitent to voice his thoughts. "Wasn't that a little cruel?" There it was, the same old unspoken topic. Everyone knew, but no one ever said a thing.

It was the same question she'd been asking herself since she'd come up with the plan. Better to hurt his feelings then let him die, she'd decided. She wasn't as cold as she pretended, and she certainly wasn't ignorant of the feelings Batou had for her. He'd shown her nothing but loyalty, and she'd given him nothing but pain in return. She'd been keenly aware of it even as she set the wheels in motion, leading him back to her safehouse.

She hadn't anticipated the Tachikoma's sacrifice. To him, her 'death' must have been salt in an open wound. She'd tried to soften the blow as best she could beforehand, but it hadn't amounted to much.

And still, he followed her.

"Major?"

"Hm?" She looked up, realizing Togusa was looking at her intently.

"You okay?"

"Fine. At any rate," she continued as she stood, "I'm sure Batou will be back to his old self in no time. It's nothing you need to worry about."

It would work itself out. That was what she wanted to believe, at any rate. But somewhere deep inside her ghost was whispering to her, telling that this time, she might have gone one step too far.


	3. The Price of Being Human

Disclaimer: Don't own Ghost in the Shell, don't own the characters. 

Note: This is what happens when you start choking on your tea, and realize the cat is giving you a look like it's the strangest thing she's ever seen. No specific episode inspiration for this one.

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It's a strange thought that pops into her head. Togusa's sitting on the couch coughing because some crude joke Batou's made has caused him to swallow his coffee wrong.

That's the price for being human. The ability to speak, the advances that ability to communicate allowed, created society. But it also made it possible to choke to death.

Of course, she couldn't. Her body was hard wired with reflexes to prevent it, and her brain could survive for a time in nothing but its titanium shell. In a way, she was beyond the forces of evolution, beyond the nature that had ultimately created her created her.

Later, she's in the bar with Batou, watching him drink, thinking back to the earlier incident, transcendental thoughts still swirling in the back of her head. She takes a sip of her drink.

"Your body is almost as artificial as mine, isn't it?"

He looks over at her. "That's a weird question. You could just bring up my file."

"Humor me."

He empties his glass. "I suppose so. More so now than when you recruited me. Kept all the important parts, though."

There's a leer in his voice, and she punches him lightly in the arm. "I'm serious."

"I know." He's quiet for a moment. "What is this about?"

"Was it hard for you? To make the choice, I mean."

"Do I regret replacing myself piece by piece with metal and complex algorithms? Not really. I'd be in pretty sad shape now if I hadn't." He looks over at her. "I had the choice, though."

She sighs, staring into her drink. "I don't really remember what it was like, before. I suppose I'm not missing much."

"Not really. But you don't remember, so you're always going to wonder. Nothing wrong with that." He refills his glass from the bottle the bartender has left. "There was only one time I hesitated. To be a Ranger, you have to give up your eyes. There's some leeway on the rest of the augmentation, but that's one thing that's nonnegotiable. There was nothing wrong with mine, of course, but they were only human, and human wasn't good enough. That was hard. Almost made me reconsider."

She blinks at him. "Really?"

"Yeah. But don't go spreading that around."

"I wouldn't, you know that." These conversations between them were always confidential. It was an unspoken agreement, the only reason they could have the conversations. "You could always swap for something more..."

"Human looking?" He shrugs. "I'm used to it now. It's a part of who I am. The same way that body is who you are. You could change your looks the way most people change their clothes, but you don't, because this is you." He reaches out, pushing her hair from her face, fingers almost but not quite brushing her cheek.

"Is that all we are, then? The sum of our parts?"

"Nah. We're who we are in spite of them. We make them ours, you know what I'm saying? I wouldn't be any less me if I changed my eyes, you wouldn't be less you if you changed out that body of yours, but we don't because they've _become_ us. A guy who looses a leg may look at the prosthetic for awhile and think '_this isn't my leg_' the same way I used to think '_these aren't my eyes,_' but eventually, it becomes his leg, like these became my eyes, and it doesn't matter that it's not flesh and blood. It's human anyway. I mean, I don't think of myself as a machine, and neither do you. Not really. Am I right?"

She finishes off her drink. "I suppose you are."

"You think too much about it. That's your problem." He tosses back the alcohol in his glass. "C'mon, Major. I'll drive you home."


	4. Recessional

Disclaimer: Don't own Ghost in the Shell, don't own the characters.

Note: It's 3:30 in the morning and I'm listening to Vienna Teng on repeat. I think the blame for this is pretty obvious.

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Recessional

What he felt wasn't lust, really. Sure, he thought about it, but he was a guy. All the cybernetic parts in the world couldn't really change that.

He could have easily looked up the specs--the model wasn't that uncommon--but it seemed a sick, almost voyeuristic thing to do, and really, he'd seen most of her already. It wasn't a matter of curiosity. More than likely, or so he told himself, it was a matter of wanting to be that close to her, get past all those walls she was constantly building between them.

It hurt, the way she constantly pushed him away.

He stared up at the dark ceiling of his bedroom, would have closed his eyes were such a thing still possible. The rejection hurt, and it hurt more because the love he had for her--he had to call it love because it wasn't platonic enough for 'like'--the love he had wasn't about the physical. He didn't need her, not like that.

All he wanted, all he'd ever wanted, really, was permission to be there for her. However she might need him. That was what he wanted. She didn't need a protector. He supposed that was what she thought. She wasn't weak, didn't need him to look after her.

It wasn't about that--never had been. He wanted to protect her from herself, from all the doubts and fears she kept bottled up inside that perfect machine she called a body. She struggled with it, always had. The dichotomy of man and machine, what separated her from the dumb mechanicals without a ghost, it was always there, pulling at her, and he could feel it somewhere beneath that composed surface. He wanted to wrap his arms around her--not to feel her against him--but because he wanted to say that he understood. She'd been given no choice in the matter, there'd been no one to speak up for her, and she was trapped for eternity in a shell of metal and wire and grown biological components. A little girl turned into someone's science experiment.

He'd watched himself be taken apart, piece by piece, year after year, becoming less and less of the person he'd been.

The walls she built were so damned high, and he cared too much to break them down. His own failing, that.

Sometimes, he hated her. Really hated her for the way she could turn it all off. Laugh with him over drinks, save his ass when it came down to the wire, let him get close enough to touch her... and take it all away. He would never forget the sight of her bloodied body on the tarmac. It was written indelibly into his brain, no matter how much he wanted to erase it, pretend it had never happened. Pretend, the way that she did, that she hadn't reached in and ripped out his heart.

And then she would tip her head to the side, look at him out of the corner of her eye, smirk the way she did when she knew something the rest of the world didn't, and the hate would evaporate away, for a time, like water in the desert.

Someday, it would drown him. He knew that. Someday, she would be the end of it all. But that was someday wasn't now, so all he could do was take it one day at a time. 


	5. Clarity

Disclaimer: Don't own Ghost in the Shell, don't own the characters. 

Note: Set after 'Jungle Cruise.' It's been mostly finished for a few months now, I just hadn't been able to think of an ending. I realize this is turning into a series of scenes set in the bar. Oh, well.

--

For three nights running, he dreams of blood and butterflies.

Technically, it's not a dream. It's a memory, replaying with total clarity. Sight, smell, sound.

"Amoretti didn't survive the flight home. I thought you should know." Delivered over drinks after work, it's a slap in the face. And for once, the Major had the grace to look sympathetic, which somehow made it worse.

He scowls at his glass. "Let me guess. He 'tried to escape' and they 'had no choice' but to shoot him."

"That's about the gist of it," she agrees. "It saves the American Empire the unfortunate ordeal of having him charged."

"Yeah, big surprise." He tosses back the drink in his glass, wishes it were actually effective at taking the edge off. "Trying him for the murders here would have brought the truth to light. Now he's dead, and no one gets any justice."

"This one really got to you."

Coming from her, it's like a gentle hand on the shoulder. She doesn't do commiseration, and he has to wonder why she's being so understanding. "What he did to those girls here, that wasn't the half of it. That day... Bright clear skies, hot sun... my unit walked into that village, and it was like someone had dropped a bomb on Heaven. They just left them there, baking in the sun. Turns out, you can live a surprisingly long time with half your skin missing."

He'd gone to see the woman they'd saved. She hadn't been conscious, but he went anyway, just to say he was sorry.

"If it's still bothering you this much, maybe you should see someone."

"What, let some cyber-specialist monkey around in my head, make it so I don't feel anything anymore? Is that what you do?"

"Of course not."

"No. I suppose _you'd_ do it yourself."

"You're in a mood," she says sourly. "Keep that up, and the boss'll order you to take a vacation."

A moment of silence, the sounds of the bar swirling between them to fill the void. He stands up. "I'm going."

There's an instant, a split second, where she looks like she's going to say something. Her eyes go back to the bartop instead, and with a shake of his head, he walks out.


	6. New Beginnings

**Disclaimer**: Ghost in the Shell isn't mine, please don't sue. I'm poor anyway. 

Minor spoilers for _Solid State Society_, so if you still haven't seen it, you may want to skip this one.

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**New Beginnings**

"Have you figured out what your next set of training runs are going to be yet?"

Batou sighed and leaned back into the couch. It had been two years, but sometimes he still found himself wondering when the hell he'd gone from a cop who took orders and chased down the bad guys to the head of the newly expanded Section 9's training program. "Nah. Frankly, they need more time with weapons. They're certainly not ready for maneuvers, yet. You get my proposals for the investigative training?"

"They're on my desk. I really don't think you need me to look them over," Togusa replied.

"Probably not, but you're the trained detective. Can't hurt. And we sure don't want our own guys tromping through crime scenes, missing the evidence."

"I suppose you're right. I'll look over it once the paperwork from this last case is cleared up." He paused, glancing around the room. "Hey... did the Major take off for the day?"

"Not like her to leave without saying something." He ran a quick query through the building's network. "Security log puts her on the roof." //Major?// He frowned when he got no reply. "Looks like she's running in autistic mode. I better go see what the hell is up."

"You sure that's a good idea," Togusa asked. "Maybe she just wants some privacy."

"She should have said something, in that case." He shrugged on his coat. "Besides, worst that could happen is her yelling at me. Wouldn't be the first time."

It was raining hard enough out on the helipad that it took him a moment to locate her on the far edge of the roof, staring out at the city swathed in fog below. In the time it took him to close the distance, the rain soaked clear through his clothes. "Major?"

His voice was nearly drowned in sound of the rain, but she either heard or sense his presence, and turned to look at him. Her hair was plastered to her face, rain running off her in rivulets. "Batou." An acknowledgment, nothing more.

"Strange time to be taking in the scenery, Major. If you hadn't noticed, it's raining."

Her laughter was unexpected, something clean and surprisingly light, coming from her. "I'd noticed that, yes."

"Think maybe you should come in now?"

"Oh, I don't know. It feels kind of freeing, don't you think?" She tipped her face skyward for a moment before turning to him and hopping down from the ledge she'd been perched on. "Did you need me for something?"

"I think Togusa wanted to run something by you, but it's not urgent. Actually, he tried to tell me not to come up here. That you probably just wanted privacy. He was probably right." He shook his head and turned to walk back the way he'd come.

"You don't have to go." He paused, looking back at her, but she'd already turned her gaze back to the city. "It almost seems peaceful this way, doesn't it?"

"Yeah. It does." He stood silent for a long moment. "You thinking about leaving again?"

She glanced back at him. "What makes you say that?"

He shrugged. "Dunno. You seem kind of distant, and this isn't exactly the same place you left." A lot had changed in two years. What had once been a well-oiled machine was now a gawky, awkward thing, trying to adjust to its own changing nature. He understood why the Chief had done it, but the growing pains were still clearly evident.

Motoko turned and sat on the ledge she'd previously been standing on. "It's true, Section 9 has changed. And I'm not quite sure where I fit into the grand scheme of things anymore, but I'm not going to leave any time soon. I needed to see what was out there, that's all."

"Get a taste of what you were missing, is that it?"

"Something like that." She smiled briefly. "I suppose it doesn't matter anymore. As it turns out, I can do just as much good here as I ever did alone."

"I suppose having Togusa take your old job does open up some possibilities."

"You know, I've been wondering. Why didn't you take the job? The Chief must have offered it to you."

"And be the guy in charge? You're kidding, right? I'm not cut out for that kinda crap. Togusa's like you. Level headed, non-judgmental. Leader material."

"And it didn't have anything to do with the fact that taking my job would have meant admitting I might not come back?" There was something in her tone, not teasing, exactly, but definitely aimed at pushing his buttons a little. A little hint of the woman he used to know.

"Thought never crossed my mind." He held out a hand. "C'mon. Let's get out of this storm before we both rust."

She took his hand and he pulled her to her feet. The temptation was there to hang on just that little bit longer, but he let it pass as he let her hand slide free of his. She was back, and that was all that really mattered.


End file.
